Evolution of the Human Diet: What We Can Learn From Hunters and Gatherers
Kara Osborne, McNair Scholar, Anthropology
Dr. Alyssa Crittenden, Faculty Mentor, Department of Anthropology
LITERATURE REVIEW
CONCLUSION
Biological indicators, such as changes in dentition, gut reduction, and a larg-
er brain (Aiello and Wheeler 1995), demonstrate that our diet has changed
throughout human evolution and has assisted in our evolutionary trajectory. Archaeological evidence suggests that the earliest signs of meat consumption date
to around 2.5 million years ago coinciding with biological changes. Among the
biological indictors and archaeological evidence, ethnographic data also shows
that the diet of ancestral hominids was one of omnivory and supports the hypothesis that the hunter-gatherer diet was highly variable(Marlowe 2010; Gremillion 2011).
The data suggest that the Hadza diet varies from season to season, based on
availability of resources. In addition, the majority of the Hadza diet is plant based,
although significant amounts of meat are consumed throughout the year – particularly during the dry season. Based on these findings, we can safely infer the
Paleolithic diet was omnivorous, variable and likely highly seasonal (Crittenden
2009).
STUDY POPULATION: THE HADZA
ABSTRACT
The Hadza are a hunter-gatherer population who live in Northern Tanzania,
East Africa. This population is ideal for studying the evolution of the human diet
because they live a lifestyle that has characterized our species for 99% of human
history (Marlowe 2010), they live in an environment similar to early members
of our genus Homo, and they may target similar foods.
The study of hunter-gatherer populations around the world can greatly inform
our understanding of the evolution of the human diet. Ethnographic research
of modern hunter-gatherers has been used to infer the possible food consumption and acquisition patterns of our ancestors. Hunter-gatherers provide the information necessary for the understanding of the past human diet, due to these
populations living similar lifestyles in similar environments, therefore procuring
similar foods.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to thank the McNair Scholars Summer Research Institute, the
UNLV Anthropology Department, and Dr. Alyssa Crittenden for her guidance
and patience.
The Hadza, a group of nomadic hunters and gatherers living in Tanzania, East
Africa, are one of the primary populations that nutritional anthropologists study
to infer what possible foods our ancestors acquired and consumed. My project
explores the diet composition of the Hadza, in combination with reviews of previous research, to provide a broader perspective on the possibilities that shaped
early hominid dietary patterns.
REFERENCES
INTRODUCTION
METHODOLOGY
There are many hypotheses on how the human diet has evolved. Some scholars claim that meat eating, tuber and honey consumption, and/or cooking are
responsible for this evolution. By turning to the exploration of the diets of hunters and gatherers, we may learn more about the diet of our early ancestors.
Behavioral data on food collection was collected by Dr. Alyssa Crittenden in
Tanzania, amongst the Hadza, between 2001-2005. All foods collected and returning to camp were weighed in a hanging spring scale and dried in the field for
preparation of laboratory analysis. All foods were then analyzed, using standard
analytical nutritional methods in the Nutritional Ecology Laboratory at Harvard
University (Crittenden 2009).
Aiello, L.C., Wheeler, P. 1995 The expensive-tissue hypothesis: The brain and the
digestive system in human and primate evolution. Current Anthropology 36, 199221.
Crittenden, A.N. 2009 Allomaternal Care and Juvenile Foraging among the Hadza:
Implications for the Evolution of Cooperative Breeding in Humans. PhD Dissertation, University of California San Diego.
Gremillion, K. 2011. Ancestral Appetite. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Ungar, P.S., Sponheimer, M. 2011. The diets of early hominins. Science 334, 190-3.
Wrangham, R. 2009. Catching Fire: How Cooking made us Human. New York:
Basic Books.